Tree Of Life

As I entered state I could feel unseen hands on my shoulders, pushing me down into my chair. I opened my eyes, and I was standing at the edge of a black circular pit. There was no way of knowing how deep it went.

For a moment I saw myself, but it was not myself, as I was present here at the precipice hovering over the black hole in the ground. I looked to the left and right and again saw myself, doubled.

On either side of myself I stood, clutching at my shoulders, pulling me back, attempting rescue myself from falling into oblivion. The pit drew me forward like a vacuum, and I, the external and doubled me, silently battled against this force.

Then without warning I let go of myself. I fell through the blackness, oddly comfortable. It was the comfort of nothingness, no fear, pain, want, pleasure, love, joy, the bliss of impending nonexistence.

I fell into deep water, with a soft landing and quickly swam to find the surface. I was in a cave once again, not one I'd seen before, but they all look the same in certain respects. I look around for an exit and saw a bright white light streaming in from around the corner.

As I approached it the light became more and more blinding until I could see nothing at all. "One more step," my mind echoed, "one more step, take one more step in faith," and I walked forward into the unknown.

I found myself falling again, with storm clouds all around, lightning, thunder, menacing and angry. Yet the storm was beautiful and intriguing. I wondered what it was saying, but the language was too garbled for me to understand.

Finally I landed in a river below. There were high cliffs all around and the clouds passed overhead quickly, propelled by a strong wind.

There was a path between the mountains that I could see from where I landed and I waded through the river, chest-deep, to the shore. As I approached the path I could see trees in the distance, a pine forest growing amid the rocky peaks. I found myself running with joy toward the pines. This was what I had been looking for. This was why I came here.

Placing both hands on the trunk of one of the pines I could feel strong vibrations, the essence of growth energy emanating through the thick, coarse bark. I wrapped my arms around the tree to try and absorb some of this life energy, and the tree was transformed.

It was now the tree at the center of the universe, swaying in the breeze of time. I tried to look up, to observe its movements, and realized I could not, because I was a part of it.

I was a drop of the golden sap flowing through the Tree of Life.

I flowed up through the branches, touching the leaves, and back down again to the roots. I brushed against the soil in which the roots held fast and found I was now laying on the ground beneath it.

Laying in its shade I could see only a small portion of it, it reached high beyond the cliffs, and the clouds, and out into the unformed spaces in the universe.

A moth fluttered nearby and soon approached me. Its body was luminous white with tinges of changing color and its wings were a dusty grayish-brown. Don't touch the wings, I reminded myself, you'll wipe off the dust and it won't be able to fly.

The moth alighted on me and began eating what appeared to be tiny crystals that had formed below my shoulders, where the hands of my second selves had held me before I fell. The moths nibbling felt like scratching an itch. It had its fill of the crystals and fluttered away, leaving a few behind.

I turned to see what else was going on here and found myself back in my chair...